This present study aims to analyze subaltern experiences in Ken Saro Wiva’s Africa Kills Her Sun and Raphl Ellison’s The Black Ball. The objective of the research is to expose the experiences of Bana and John as subalterns in the two stories and find the similarities and differences between both.

The data taken are in the form of words, sentences, and phrase from two selected short stories written by Ken Saro Wiva’s Africa Kills Her Sun (2000, 519-525) and Raphl Ellison’s The Black Ball (2002, 145-156). This study is conducted in postcolonial approach by employing the theory of subaltern of Gayatry Chakravorty Spivak. By applying the subaltern theory, the statement of the problem are 1) What does Bana experience as subatern in Ken Saro Wiva’s Africa Kills Her Sun, 2) What does John experience as subaltern in Raphl Ellison’s The Black Ball?, 3) What are the similarities and differences of the cases which happen to subalterns experience in both stories?. To know their experience, it is analyzed by identifying epistemic violence that is conducted by ruling class as a way of domination. This epistemic violence consists of discriminatory, testimonial and distributive.

The results of the study show that the experience received by Bana and John resemble one another. They come from the low social class, that is as worker. However, there presents a bit difference. Generally, Bana confronts the unfair treatment in law and John has perceived discrimination due to the skin color. To face it, Bana tends to be a bit anarchic even though it is denied while John prefers being silent and keeping it like someone fears to be oppressed. Above all, they both have achieved education but it seems not important due to the impact of distributive epistemic violence. Therefore, both characters are still under domination until the end of the story.